


Face to Face, Eye to Eye

by youworeblue



Category: Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: F/M, Gen, Rival Shipping, of course
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-16
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:53:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21823222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youworeblue/pseuds/youworeblue
Summary: She can't look him in the eye the whole time they're registering. She knows what her strategy will be, and it feels somehow like it's cheating. But because it's Hop, too, it feels like it's a crime. Not only is she going to win, and crush his dream of facing Leon, she's going to do the gutless thing and crush his team without giving him a chance to fight back. This won't be the glorious battle of his dreams.Even if he ever forgives her for it, she's not sure she'll ever forgive herself.
Relationships: Hop/Yuuri | Gloria
Comments: 10
Kudos: 139





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Not gonna do a full let's play narrative like I'm doing with Zelda, but you know my overactive imagination couldn't resist some rival shipping.
> 
> My "Gloria" is Lide.

She can't look him in the eye the whole time they're registering. She knows what her strategy will be, and it feels somehow like it's cheating. But because it's Hop, too, it feels like it's a crime. Not only is she going to win, and crush his dream of facing Leon, she's going to do the gutless thing and crush his team without giving him a chance to fight back.

This won't be the glorious battle of his dreams. Even if he ever forgives her for it, she's not sure she'll ever forgive herself.

She had the faster team. She had the type advantage down, from the pokemon to the moves. And she wanted this like she had only ever wanted one other thing in the world, and that was why it was so hard to write her name on the registration card. Why it was so hard to put on the damn uniform. Why she couldn't raise her eyes when she stepped out onto the field.

Why she nearly cried when it turned out that she was facing Marnie first. She had once been the punk queen's biggest fan, and here she was about to usurp her throne. She would have felt worse about it though, were it not for the hope that someone else might be beating Hop right now and maybe she wouldn't have to live with the shame of it all.

But when she turned her back on Marnie, Hop was staring out at her from the locker room with the biggest smile. She wasn't mentally present while he spoke to her; she couldn't have been. She would have collapsed in a puddle or run away if she had been conscious. She had no idea what he said to her before he ran back out onto the pitch and left her reeling.

She healed her pokemon up and held a pokeball to her lips and whispered an apology to Hop that he'd never hear.

She hardly had to speak to her pokemon these days. They knew how to win, now, trained well and attuned to her style and strategy. None of them knew better, knew to pull their punches. They didn't know that this was Hop's loyal team, loyal and unchanging since they left Postwick months ago. Only her Rillaboom would know, would perhaps hesitate, and that was where maybe some god would intervene and save her from this fate.

If she had been watching, and maybe one day if she has the stomach to look at the tapes, she'll see Rillaboom look back at her once with a question in his eyes. It went unanswered, with her gaze firmly on the ground, and she hardly noticed the choices Rillaboom was making until it was almost too late, and a determined Hop Gigantamaxed his starter to try and salvage the match and the dream and --

Lide locked eyes with Hop as she silently Dynamaxed her distressed Rillaboom, and she tried to apologize in that one look for the lifetime of hurt she was about to impart.

When the match was called, Rillaboom seemed to try to melt into the grass and hide. The match was over in record time--only Inteleon had managed to get one counterpunch in, and even then it had been a sad showing against her over-powered Rillaboom.

Lide was too distracted to call him back to his pokeball. Her hands were clenched in fists at her sides, so tight that her nails cut through the leather of the uniform gloves and left marks on her palms.

Hop, beautiful Hop, stood with his head bowed across the pitch from her, seemingly miles and miles away. His gaze was lowered to the pokeball in his hand, and he stood motionless as the stadium continued to erupt in its endless barrage of noise that left no room for thoughts.

Lide heard the crackle in her ear that alerted her their mics were on once more. Suddenly, her throat felt full of glass. She wanted to run to him, but her legs wouldn't carry her. Her knees were locked, and if she moved an inch, they'd buckle.

It would have to be Hop. He would be the one who decided how this ended. Blessed Hop, wretched Hop, foolish, foolish Hop with his mane of curls plastered to his forehead by rain and his lionlike eyes dark with bitterness. Lide couldn't stand the sight, but she forced herself to as punishment for her crime. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes, and her face twisted as she tried to hold them back. For all those watching on the big screen and at home, it would have seemed that she had been the one to lose.

"You know, when Sonia said we could be heroes... I never really felt that. But when I look at you, I think she's right. And I'm going to work ever harder to be your match, Lide." Hop crossed the pitch to stand in front of her. She didn't realize she was shaking until his steady, warm hands settled on her shoulders. "I'm glad it was you, Lide, not these random pricks from who-knows-where. My true rival. Now it's my turn to rival you."

He gave her shoulders a squeeze and then set off slowly for the locker room. She raised a hand too late to catch him, and let it fall. There was no one else in the world Lide could turn to now. Alone in the center of the world, she bowed her head and cried.

* * *

She hardly toweled off. Her clammy skin was covered in goosebumps as she threw her uniform in a locker and began buttoning the white dress she'd worn to destroy her best friend. She wrung out her hair a little, and then she pulled on her too-large leather jacket to hide beneath. She had felt tall when she bought those creepers, had felt like she was made of steel when she got that haircut. Now she felt nothing except small and hollow. How could it be that she felt weaker now, emptier, more scared now, than she had when they first set out from Postwick months ago?

She was swarmed by paparazzi and microphones as soon as she stepped out of the waiting area.

"Challenger! Challenger!" She stumbled. "Challenger Lide, you and Challenger Hop grew up alongside each other in Postwick . How does it feel now that you've finally faced each other, after all these years?"

After all these years? They had battled just a week ago, and she had won then, too. She had hoped he'd adapt his strategy to hers, train as hard as she had, before this match...

"Hop's the reason I became a trainer. Hop's why I started this shit. Hop's..." The tears overpowered her voice and she couldn't even think of what she was trying to say except, Hop's the one.

"Alright, can't you see she's spent? Challenger Lide poured her heart out on that field, give her a moment to recharge!" Leon pushed his way through--well, the ocean of people parted for him to stride through--to Lide's rescue. His big hand on her shoulder was arresting, and he steered her deftly out of the eyes of the public and through a private tunnel beneath the stadium.

He was uncharacteristically quiet as they walked, until about halfway down the tunnel, in the quiet, he stopped and sighed. "I can only imagine the mixed emotions you must be dealing with right now, Little Lide." Leon offered her a small smile. "I feel a little responsible for it too. I set you off on this path with Hop in the first place, and I framed you as his rival, not his partner. And you've played the part well, I must say. My little bro's a fantastic trainer, and he's got spirit like nothing I've ever seen. That's thanks to you. I know you were just saying it's all Hops doing, and maybe it is, but you're here because you deserve to be."

"But it shoulda been Hop," she rasped, looking up at the Champion with dead eyes. "I coulda given him a chance, at least."

"It's _my_ job to entertain people, Lide. It's _your_ job to _win_." Leon's face was suddenly stony. "Hop is going to be fine. If you beat me, then he'll have to beat me too--cause I'll be fighting like hell to reclaim my title. Imagine how he'll feel then, facing his bro and his biggest rival in the same tournament next year! Over the moon, I'm sure. Hop is gonna be fine, Lide. You didn't leave a single opening on the field -- don't leave your heart wide open now."

She chewed her lip as he spoke, until it bled. "Are you...are you telling me not..." She looked down at her scratched palms.

"You've waited this long, what's a little longer, to let things settle between you two?" Leon gave her hair a ruffle. "Besides, if you were gonna do anything, it shoulda been on the pitch. Nothing says I love you like when it's on camera!"


	2. Chapter 2

Lide didn't even turn on the lights when she got back to her hotel room. Her Umbreon awaited her, and its soft yellow glow was all she could stand. She buried herself beneath the down comforter and wrapped herself around her warm little pokemon and let herself cry. At one point in the night she thought she heard someone call her name, but when she held her hiccups and tried to listen, there was no follow up.

She fell back in bed and cried herself into oblivion.

She woke to a million text messages from her mother, and Hop's ma, and Sonia and Leon. But none from Hop. She left the rest unanswered and went down to the lobby with her Bisharp as a bodyguard. She felt rough around the edges and sharp and dangerous, and Bisharp could communicate all of that with one mean look and some sharp edges of his own. She didn't find Hop in the lobby. She stood in the center of the large hall for a long while, staring blankly at the door while she tried to piece together what to do. _"You've waited this long."_ Leon's words rattled around in her empty head, but Lide was determined to ruin everything, all at once, rather than have it all fall apart piece-wise. But she just needed to find Hop.

She glanced at her phone again. Sonia: _"Call me."_

She retreated with Bisharp into the deserted hotel bar and left him posted at the door to keep the rabble out. Rotom took her phone flying over the bar while it rang Sonia, and Lide looked around idly at the velvet and leather decor. She should have been celebrating in here last night, surely. How often had Leon boasted about the free rounds that awaited him after every victory? Hadn't she wanted a piece of that herself?

"This is me calling, Professor Sonia," she said dryly the moment the older woman picked up.

"Before I was Professor, I was a Challenger too," Sonia shot back. Lide looked up with raised eyebrows. She had expected some sort of concerned lecture, probably for crying on live television, but she wasn't sure where _this_ track was going. "You know how that ended?"

"Of course not," Lide replied, "you and Leon are really cagey about it."

Sonia was talking while walking, and her head was on a swivel as she navigated the crowds out wherever she was. The sunglasses ever perched on her head flashed in the midmorning light. "I've never admitted this to anyone, Lide. Leon obviously suspects, but--oh, I don't know why I'm still pretending--I threw my qualifying match against him. Looked like I gave it my all, but it was just another battle for him to dominate, right? No one remembers it, except--except him, and except me."

Lide felt a shot of ice in her blood as Sonia's confession hit her in waves. She could piece everything together now: how the childhood friends could have developed this strange distance, tinged with rivalry; how Sonia ended up on this path, aimless and frustrated; why she could appreciate what Lide and Hop had between them, in a way that Lide was only just now starting to appreciate. Sonia had once stood where Lide had, on that pitch, perhaps certain of her ability to beat Leon...and she had been brave enough to step aside to let her friend keep dreaming. Certainly braver than Lide.

Lide's eyes burned, but she blinked up at the Rotom resolutely. "I destroyed him, Sonia," she said gravely. "What's he going to do now?"

"Come on, Lide, it's Hop. He'll be _fine._ " Sonia waved a hand. "It's no worse than feeling like a fraud for six years because you suspect your rival _let_ you win out of _pity,_ which is how I'm sure Leon feels sometimes. You didn't take anything from Hop. You gave him what he wanted: a battle at the top, with his rival. It was honest, Lide. It was authentic. It wasn't a _lie._ "

Lide sank down in her chair and blew out her cheeks. She had no idea what to say to that, because _"But it was!"_ felt childish, and even she knew that Sonia was right. Leon was right. She had won that match fair and square, and she had worked so hard to reach this level. "Sonia," she sighed, " _you_ should talk to Leon."

"About what?" Sonia snorted. "You think I haven't tried? It never goes anywhere. He's happy with how things are now. All he has is a suspicion, and that won't kill him."

"But you two don't talk at all anymore, and both of you hate _that,_ " Lide said, looking up at the ceiling. "You're not just Sonia-Stay-At-Home. You're Sonia-Leon's-Rival, and that didn't have to end when he _won._ "

Sonia was quiet for a moment. "Yes it did." She sighed. "I was tired of pushing _him_ to be better. It was so hard to chase him, to remain a challenge to him, and I felt like it was his turn to chase me, to push me. And you know what? He never did."

Lide bowed her head.

"Thanks, Sonia," she said softly. "I know what I have to do."

* * *

Lide sent one message: _Now._

It occurred to her that maybe she should tell him _where,_ or _how,_ or _why,_ but she couldn't bring herself to without spilling everything out of her thumbs. He would find a way, anyway, if he wanted to come.

She bundled up and hiked out of Wyndon into the snowy pass where they had last battled. All signs of their week-old scuffle had been buried under another layer of snow, but the memory of the place had been burned into her memory. It had been more of a struggle, because she was trying to coax out all his moves, all his stats, his strategies, and that meant she had to send out some of her B team to battle in the cold. There had been a moment when the sun peeked out from behind the clouds and illuminated him from behind with red, red like the stupid cape his brother wore, and it had looked _so much better_ on Hop.

She was worried that he'd keep her waiting, or maybe he'd never come at all, but only a few minutes after she arrived, he came crunching his way through the snow up to the hill.

He had his hands stuffed in his pants, and his fur-trimmed hood pulled up over his head, but she'd know him from a mile away because of those golden eyes. She could see that he was unsmiling as he walked, but as soon as he crested the hill and saw her, a semblance of his historically permanent grin reappeared. It wasn't the same, though, and it could have killed her.

"I was imagining it'd be a few months before you wanted to battle again," he said, settling into a casual stance about ten feet away. "Give me some time to train, be a worthy opponent again."

 _Oh._ Oh, that's what he thought this was? A _rematch?_ Hysteria threatened to sank its claws in her chest, and she opened her mouth in shock and horror but nothing would come out.

"What, liepard got your tongue, Lide? I heard you were real stoic with poor Marnie, but I was a little offended when you didn't even have a quip for me!" He gave a short, harsh laugh that wasn't humorous at all. "C'mon, mate. And what was with the tears? It's all over the news now--hey. Hey?"

With no hope of finding her voice, and with the forced nonchalance in his voice hitting her like an assault, Lide could do nothing but give over to her horror once more. Tears rolled down her face and froze where they fell. Her vision blurred, but she could feel his warmth like a beacon as he approached. She fisted her hands in the hem of her jacket to keep herself from throwing herself at him, and as she ground her teeth, a wretched sob fought its way out of her chest against her will.

"Hey, Lide..." Hop's gloved hands pushed her hair back from her wet face, and with hesitant fingers he tried to brush away her tears. "What _is_ with the tears? Did something happen?"

"I'm just so sorry," she said. It would be selfish to lean into him; it would be selfish to wrap her arms around him and hold on to him for dear life. "And now I'm making this about me--"

"It can be about you," Hop said quickly. "If something's wrong, tell me."

"No, it's about _you,_ " she insisted. She reached up to cover one of his hands with her own, and then she pulled it away from her face and held his hand in both of her own. She sniffled mightily and spoke to his hand. "I wouldn't be here without you, Hop. I wouldn't have _wanted_ to be here, if you hadn't begged me to take Grookie and set out with you. And I feel so bad for wanting it, when it's what you wanted, first. I _don't_ want to be here without you, Hop." She tightened her grip on his hand and squeezed her eyes shut as she tried to hold it together, just for one moment more. "It's not fair, and I'm sorry, and I want you to train and beat me someday, but..."

With the hand that wasn't held hostage in hers, Hop cradled the back of her head and pushed it into his chest. His voice rumbled in his chest so loud she almost couldn't hear, but he spoke right into her hair. "I meant what I said. I wouldn't have been able to lose to anyone else, Lide. That's as fair as anything, and that's all I ever wanted."

"That's the worst part," she said into his chest. "I want _more._ "

"Hm?"

Lide reluctantly extricated herself from his embrace, though she tried to catalogue every sensation--his smell, his warmth that had seeped into her clothes and her bones, the feeling of her arms wrapped around his lean waist--in case it was the last time. She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and looked up at her childhood friend. "I don't want you to leave to Arceus-knows-where to train and show up once a year to battle me, Hop," she said.

He was very quiet and very, very still. She stared at him intently, hoping against hope that he could read her mind.

"I'll always be cheering you on," he said at last, "but I... You can understand that I might want a bit of a breather, maybe go home and watch your match with your ma, keep her company, y'know?"

"Hop!" She covered her face with her hands, and then she reached for him, fisted her hands in his jacket collar, and looked into his eyes. "You can do what you want, but I want you to _want to be with me._ Maybe not now, but...someday. For real."

She could see the cogs turning behind his eyes, see in real time as he processed her words one-by-one and began to realize what they meant. She also realized that she had no idea what she wanted him to say, what she wanted him to do, now. Why had she done this? Why hadn't she listened to Leon and given them both some time to figure that out?

"You're the best trainer I know. And you're funny and sweet and so, so passionate, and you're the reason I'm so driven, and I just... I just want you to know how much I... I appreciate you." She slowly eased her fingers off of his jacket collar and took a step back. "And I'm sorry that I just made it so complicated maybe, but... I'll just always be rooting for you, Hop, wherever you are." She gave him a watery smile, gave him a beat or two to say--something, anything--but he was silent and slack-jawed.

Lide continued to smile as she turned and headed back in the direction of Wyndon. New tears melted down her face, but she had a match to prepare for, and, it seemed, he had a taxi to catch home.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a pointless fic thanks

She had bested the best, bested gym leaders who had trained year after year for this and she'd blown right through all of them after only a few months of grueling training and soul-searching in the wilderness.

After each match she'd gone back to her rotom phone and looked through the cheers from her fam and friends, and in the list of people her mom had invited over for a viewing party was Hop, but otherwise there was no other mention of him let alone a direct message. It had only made her angrier--at him, but primarily at herself, and maybe a little at Sonia--and she channeled that anger into a climbing battlefield ferocity that even Raihan commented on.

"I know a dragon when I see one, babe," he'd said as they walked back to the locker room, her victorious fans singing behind them.

She'd redone her eyeliner defiantly and prepared herself for Leon's dramatics out there on the field--only for the damn Chairman to interrupt her bitter moment of glory. Leon'd told her to let the adults take care of it, but she'd known what Hop would do. They met in silence within the Slumbering Weald, and they'd flown together back to the power plant, somehow perfectly aware of what they would be facing.

They were separated while they navigated the plant, and when she caught up to him it was just in time to see his wooly friend fall to the Chairman.

"Finish it up for me, would you, Hero?" Hop drawled, trying to sound nonchalant, but his voice shook. Then, he stepped back--to both Rose and Lide's surprise.

Lide tried to make quick work of the Chairman, because she wasn't done with Hop. After Rose was forced to concede that he was outmatched, outnumbered, and misguided, Lide ran after Hop and found him at the elevator, healing his team.

"Get it together, Hop," she said, perhaps a little harsher than she should have. He didn't look up at her. "So what ya haven't beat me--yet? You've beaten everyone else you faced. You definitely coulda wiped the floor with Rose. You're chosen by that shield _just_ as much as I was chosen by the sword."

They were interrupted by a loud explosion above them.

Without responding to her tirade, Hop pressed the button on the elevator.

_Going up._

* * *

Leon had fallen under the wing of his Charizard to weather the dust storm that erupted from Eternatus' tantrum, and it was from that vantage point that he saw Hop and Lide run onto the roof. He threw out a hand for them to stop, but Charizard was hit with another blast of red-hot fury from the skeletal creature above them, and Leon was sent flying back toward the edge of the roof.

"Lee!" Hop cried, and he took a step toward his brother. But he caught himself.

"Lide... I should take care of Leon! He's hurt. He's my brother-- You've got this in the bag--"

"You're not gonna have a brother unless _we_ take this thing down, Hop!" She tossed a pokeball in the air and shot a prayer to the heavens. "You were meant to be here, with me, facing the Darkest Day with the sword and shield of legend." Behind her, Eternatus screamed, and the heat of it sent her hair and skirt flying. She winced. "This isn't a regulated match, Hop. If it kills me--"

She stopped, blinking away tears as the consequences of a failure here truly sank in. Hop stared at her, lips parted as horror and grief split his face. As Eternatus unleashed another furious wail and swooped toward what it undoubtedly presumed was its next meal, Lide drew the rusty sword, and she turned to face the legendary horror alone with her Haxorus.

Who fell instantly to Eternatus's breath weapon.

Flygon didn't fare much better, batted from the air by the creature's whip-like tail. Lide's heart was in her throat as she sent out Bisharp, and her voice was twisted with fear as the knightly pokemon braced itself in front of her as best it could and prepared to weather the inevitable.

And then Hop took her hand, and her sword began to glow.

Hop was warm against her side as he called out his team. There was something strange and heady in the air, something about the sounds, the smells, the light, that changed when Hop stood beside her and they faced certain death. It felt like maybe, just maybe, they would make it through this. Together.

Their blows encountered resistance, as sometimes happened in raid battles at dynamax dens, but Hop's grip on her hand tightened and they urged their teams to continue fighting. Something had to change. Something had to give.

A blinding light, a cascade of fire, psychic energy, and a shockwave washed over Hop and Lide then In that moment of deafness, with all sensations robbed of her except that of her thundering heart and Hop's body shielding her from the blast, Lide was content to die.

Her hearing returned to her as the air split with two piercing howls.

The legendary creatures, strange beings who wielded both the strange power of pokemon and the sword and shield of ancient mortals, the Pokemon who had chosen Lide and Hop--they stood before the heroes and howled to rally their spirits.

Their flagging teams jumped to the legendary pokemons' sides, ready for action, and the chosen trainers stepped forward to take their place as commanders of the field. There was a clear note in the Hero pokemons' voice that the battle was far from won.

But they would not allow Lide and Hop and their teams to succumb to despair.

Whether from true exhilaration or simply from the adrenaline promised by near-death, Hop cheered and bantered through it all like nothing was out of the ordinary--after all, all battles were legendary in his mind--but after the dust had settled he had been quiet and contemplative. Lide had picked up the innocent, evil-filled pokeball and turned to find Hop staring at her with an inscrutable look on his face.

She had no time to speak with him, because Sonia had appeared with the police to take away Rose and document all that had transpired, and somehow in the ruckus Hop disappeared. It was Lide's face on the news again, not quite as miserable as it had been after her match with Hop, but still not the face of a triumphant hero of Galar.

* * *

Etarnatus slumbered in its innocuous pokeball at the bottom of her bag, Rose was in a cushy prison cell, and Leon was assuring the crowds gathered in Wyndon and around their tellies that the Champion match was scheduled for two days' time. And now Hop was nowhere to be found. 

Lide needed the two days to deal with the tumult of emotions in her. She rang Leon once, got him on the phone, to cancel--to withdraw--but he'd hung up on her as soon as he heard the first words come out of her mouth. She was thankful for him in that regard, because she immediately regretted even thinking of throwing in the towel. She had to give it to the "adults" this time: she really didn't know how she was feeling, and she was glad that they seemed to know her better than she did at the moment.

She woke the morning of the match with a strange sense of calm.

Marnie and Piers both wished her well, as did her mother and Sonia. Sonia mentioned something about Zacian and Zamazenta and a book, but Lide was swiftly distracted by a "pep talk" from Raihan about bringing Leon back down to their level, as a favor to the dragon gym leader. She felt cheeky enough to send him a teasing jab, but then she turned her phone off and began her final preparations for her battle to be Champion. Her fingers itched to call Hop, but she curled them tightly around her pokeballs instead.


	4. Chapter 4

Lee's far-too-big jersey was draped over her shoulders like a cape, her Pokemon were practically drunk on berries, and if Marnie got her way then Lide was well on her way to joining them.

The hotel bar was wild with celebration, because Galar had a new Champion. Lee wasn't even close to being sore about it, though he happily milked pity from the gaggle of admirers who were literally clinging to his shirtless form at the end of the bar.

It had honestly all been a blur since Charizard fell to a critical Night Slash from steely Bisharp. Lide was grateful for Leon's love of screentime, because his undoubtedly marvelous speech went on and on, and then they had to cut to commercial and he dragged her off the pitch to begin celebrating. She was lucky enough to grab on to Marnie's hand somewhere in the commotion, and now the girls were tossing back shots with her brother and Raihan--hopefully to forget about everything that had transpired over the past week.

Lee's jersey smelled a lot like him, which meant it smelled a lot like Hop, and Lide really wanted to forget about that. She suspected that maybe the smell was why Raihan leaned so close to her at the bar, kept giving her that snaggle-toothed grin of his that she did not appreciate...normally.

She said as much, when Raihan started leaning on her shoulder a little too heavily. "Do I smell like your boyfriend, Raihan?"

He snorted and looked away, while Piers and Marnie guffawed at his expense. Raihan muttered something undoubtedly very cool and blase, but Lide was proud that she'd managed to get a blush creeping up his neck. She had a feeling that the dragon gym leader rarely had the pleasure of being on the receiving end of such teasing.

Marnie blessedly didn't comment when Raihan's arm found its way to her shoulder a few hours and several more shots later, and maybe Piers wouldn't mention it, and maybe even Lee wouldn't notice-- 

As gravity's hold on both Lide and Raihan increased, Lide's steely, logical side checked back in and sounded an alarm. She'd had her fun, but she would never allow herself to be reckless. There were bound to be consequences, and she'd only just become Champion so there would be plenty of future... opportunities, and putting Raihan in his place wouldn't be such a bad thing. Her soft, warm, gooey side was able to temper her words a bit better than usual, because she liiiked how soft and warm she felt under Raihan's arm, with his warm, calloused hand on hers, and his cheek on her shoulder.

"Raihannnn, I don't wanna be mean--"

He barked a laugh that nearly knocked both of them off their stools. "Since when?!"

"Since we're friends," she insisted. "We weren't before! But I don't wanna be mean to you, I liiiked you, but I'm not... not tonight, pal, buddy, friend--"

He laughed again, raucously, and raised her hand to his cheek briefly before releasing her entirely. She immediately regretted the loss of his warmth, but Marnie slipped in to take Raihan's spot, and that was nice too. "Not tonight, sure," he said, slipping another League card into her jacket pocket. "You're in a league of your own, Lide. Enjoy it while it lasts!"

Marnie kicked at him good-naturedly, then scoffed as Lide slumped onto her shoulder for support.

"Bro, lookit her, drunk with fame already," she teased. "Whad'ya think. Bedtime yet?"

"Nooo," Lide groaned into Marnie's shoulder. "What if Hop comes and I'm not here?"

Piers and Marnie shared a half-lidded look that Lide, drunk as she was, could feel. She pushed away from Marnie and reached for a pitcher of water nearby.

"Lookit, I'll sober up. Just... I need to stay. Y'know?"

"You're not havin' fun, Lide," Marnie said. "Would you rather Hop come in and see ya moping here, or have him come in and know you had a good time and went to bed by yourself?"

Lide gave her a hard stare as she sloppily filled her glass with water. Marnie returned it with a cool look of her own, and Lide finally admitted defeat and turned her eyes down at the bartop as she guzzled her water.

"You're gonna finish that pitcher, and then we're goin' back to your room. Piers'll have to help me, I figure, 'cause that Bisharp of yours might gut ya if you trip. But we'll get ya to bed and keep our lips zipped, eh?"

"Might be inspired to write a sad, sad song about it," Piers drawled, "but I'll give you pseudos."

Lide stuck her tongue out into her cup and grumbled something, but she knew Marnie was right. Hop wasn't gonna come, and even if he did show up, she'd be too drunk and upset to keep from saying more things she might regret.

* * *

Sometime in the middle of the night, Umbreon woke her with a heavy paw prodding her in the back. Someone was knocking quietly on her hotel room door, and she had been too dead asleep to hear it.

Sitting up was a struggle, and as soon as she was vertical, she felt the tension in her neck and back flare up into a massive whole-body ache. Her head throbbed, and her mouth felt like crusty old gym socks.

It wasn't the middle of the night, it turned out, but sometime in the god-forsaken pre-dawn. Lide forced herself to get out of bed, and by some heroic effort stumbled over to the door. She was too short to look comfortably through the peep hole, and she honestly didn't even think of the possibilities of danger or fame, before she pulled open the door and squinted blearily into the too-bright hallway.

Yellow eyes blinked down at her, wide in shock, framed by dark circles--and then Hop looked away down the hall and ran a hand through his hair. "Uh, maybe this is a bad time."

"What time is it?" she asked through a yawn. "It's not a bad time."

"You sure?"

"I always have time for ya," she replied quietly, and she turned back into her room. He caught the door just before it closed and followed her, but he remained in the little hallway with his eyes trained on the ground. "Come in, Hop." She yawned again.

"Uh... Lide, how drunk are you?"

"Pretty badly, still, I think," she groaned, rubbed her eye, and then realized what she hadn't noticed before. At some point she'd ripped off her dress, and it lay on the floor with her shoes and her jacket. She was in her bra and her spandex shorts, and that's why Hop wouldn't make eye contact.

"Shit. Shit. Shit."

She scrambled for her dress and pulled it clumsily to her chest, where she couldn't figure out the buttons or the sleeves and the more she tried, the more her distress mounted, until she dropped the dress again and looked down at the floor in defeat. Tears welled in her eyes as she mentally berated herself for making Hop feel uncomfortable, for getting this shitfaced in the first place, for the jokes she'd made with Raihan that she hoped Hop never heard, for the past several days of being so unfair to Hop, and--

The young man in question crossed the room and bent to pick up the dress.

"Hey," he said softly, and took one of her arms and fed it through a sleeve. She started to cry in earnest when he managed to get the dress fully around her, both sleeves on, and began the slow work of buttoning it back up.

"This'll be really funny in the morning, I'm sure.

" "No it won't," she blubbered. "I ruin everything for you, Hop."

Hop may have just taken a moment to collect his thoughts, but to Lide in that moment it felt like a poignant, painful silence that went on forever. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to quell her tears, but they flooded down her cheeks with renewed vigor. She was seconds away from all-out sobbing, she was sure, and that only made her feel more wretched.

Hop sat on the bed beside her and looked down at his hands, clasped in his lap. "You haven't ruined anything, Lide. I just need some time to figure out how to be myself again, without being your rival, without being Leon's brother, without having my entire life wrapped around being Champion," he said at last. "I need to figure out what I really want now. I haven't figured it out yet but I..."

She looked up at him with a trembling lip she couldn't control. "It's so thoughtful of you to tell me," she said with a whimper. "I thought you were going to ignore me and hate me forever. This is okay. This is okay." She patted his arm, even as tears splattered down in her lap.

He covered her wet hand with his own and leaned against her shoulder, his cheek against her head. "I can't hate you, Lide. You just confuse me." He was silent for a moment, then continued in a careful voice. "I always feel like you're expecting me to be better than I am, like you're disappointed in me."

She gasped. "No!" She turned to stare up into his eyes, but she couldn't see them in the darkness. She could instead only feel the warmth of his breath across her wet cheeks and lips, and his hair tickling her forehead, and he was so close-- Lide closed her eyes firmly. "It's just so frustrating when you tell yourself you shouldn't even try a thing just because something didn't work the first time," she said, "because I do know you're better than you think you are. I admire you so much. And if you don't have the dedication, or aren't brave enough, or if you aren't strong enough to do something, how can I be?"

She exhaled heavily. His forehead was against hers now, and his one hand was on hers but his other hand was on her other arm now, slightly angling her body to face him more.

"We're heroes. We're rivals. We're two sides of a coin. I want us to be a team, Hop."


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I only write this on my phone so sorry for typos and lazy capitalization >_> y'all wouldn't mind if we time jump into some sleezy stuff would ya

Lide woke with no sense of what time it was, where she was, what had happened to get her to this point--nothing except for a full headache that originated at the knot of tense muscle at the back of her neck.

Her hotel room was mercifully dark; the heavy curtains were shut tight, and no light penetrated the room.

Her phone lay on the bedside table, plugged in and charging. She knew it hadnt been her own foresight--she hardly remembered to be so responsible when she was sober--and she had to wrack her aching brain to recall who might have been the thoughtful culprit.

Perhaps Marnie? Raihan hadn't come back with her, right? Or had he? No... Someone else had come in last night. Someone else had pulled her into his lap and held her tightly until she fell asleep again. Someone else had left a long series of text message for her at 4:30am:

4:34am - You're pretty drunk right now and I don't know how much you'll remember, so I wanted to let you know: you made me promise to stay in touch while I head out exploring and training. We pinky promised. I was always the one who insisted on pinky swearing everything when we were kids, but this was the first time you ever insisted, so I'm taking it really seriously, Lide. I'll be in touch. I promised ya.

4:36am - You were starting to fall asleep sitting up, I think, but you said something about Raihan and how you were worried I'd be upset. I don't really know what you were talking about or what I'd be upset about but you were really worried about it, so I just wanted to tell you in writing so you remember, I'm not upset.

4:45am - I don't hate you.

5:07am - We're two sides of the same coin, Lide. We'll never be apart for long. Don't slack off while I'm gone -- I don't want an easy fight.

5:07am - I'll miss you 

Lide let her phone drop back into the blankets and squeezed her eyes shut against the screen burn, but a small smile passed across her face. Hop was as plain and transparent as always. He couldn't help it. And she'd have it no other way: no guessing, no playing.

He'd miss her. "We'll never be apart for long."

Whatever that meant.

She'd try not to read into it too much.

  
Lide finally rose late in the day and tried to regain her personhood by showering and brushing her teeth--two tasks that proved Herculean in this state. As she squinted at her phone and brushed her teeth with a slow, heavy hand, she saw a message come in from Leon:

first champion lesson: do fewer tequila shots 

The message was followed by a nauseated emoji, so she guessed that she wasn't the only one hungover. With her toothbrush sticking from her mouth, she grabbed her phone to respond.

You have more lessons planned?? what am I supposed to do now ........

Leon, ever addicted to his phone, responded instantly:

get chicks, or dicks idk

jk I shouldn't be saying that to my lil bros lil friend

train. do what you've been doing to be the very best, like no one ever was. train your mon, mostly. the league will prolly have some law-keeping and research-gathering that only the ~strongesy trainer in the land~ can deal with 

lol I'm almost thankful to have a break!!!

Lide guffawed, spraying toothpaste, and quickly finished brushing her teeth. She went back to her unmade bed and kicked up her feet as she considered her options. Where in Galar did champions train? should she wander? should she keep in touch with the gym leaders? how many months was it gonna be before her first challenge?

she decided that the first thing she needed to do was head home and see her mother and Sonia. If she wasn't needed pressingly at the league, she might as well attend to those personal responsibilities. Maybe before she skipped town she'd speak to Leon in person, and in the meantime, she needed to thank Marnie for looking out for her drunk ass.

"Hey, Marnie. I'm alive."

"Ach, I knew ya'd be fine," Marnie drawled across the Rotom. "You guzzled a fair tankard of water before we dragged ya home. I'm learnin' you know your way around a sitch or two." Marnie yawned. "Whatcha plannin' today, Champion?"

"Dunno. I haven't had coffee yet."

"I'll meet you downstairs then."

Marnie and Lide met up in the lobby and headed out for coffee without saying much in greeting. It was clear that though the punk idol hadn't drank as much as Lide, she'd still had enough to feel it the next day. They both needed the coffee, desperately.

"So you just pass out all night then?" Marnie asked once they'd ordered coffee at a stand and set off walking around the city's waterway.

"Hop came by in the middle of the night," Lide said. When Marnie's eyes grew wide, Lide laughed. "And I wasn't wearing any clothes! I didn't even notice. Poor bloke."

Marnie nearly spat out her coffee. "Well I'm certainly glad I didn't let ya leave with the dragon!" she said incredulously. "What happened?!"

"We just talked," Lide said into her coffee cup. "I was still drunk but he knew I wouldn't remember what we talked about so he texted me a summary."

She passed Marnie her Rotom without another word and sipped at her coffee while Marnie read Hop's messages. Marnie cooed. "Liiiide, bless 'im."

Lide smiled into her cup as she took her phone back. "I wanted us to travel together I guess, but just knowing he'll miss me and keep in touch... it'll have to be good enough."

"Where do you wanna go though?" Marnie asked. "You already been to the darkest mines and the wildest parts of central Galar!"

"North," Lide mused, "or cross the Channel. Take a battle cruise or go on an expedition with Sonia to catalogue some new 'mon on deserted isles... I just wanna go somewhere new."

Marnie sighed a little. "That sounds just like ya," she said. "Don't go running off to Hoenn, then. Their legends are far more vicious than those sword and shield 'mon."

Lide turned her eyes outward to the skyline. "Maybe I'll look into them, too. But it feels like I shouldn't, without Hop."


End file.
